


Can You Feel Me?

by QueenOfNewOrleans22



Series: Either - Or [1]
Category: Guns N' Roses
Genre: Angst, Arguing, Blood and Injury, Heavy Angst, M/M, Suicide, Suicide Notes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-14
Updated: 2020-11-14
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:08:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,307
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27552856
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QueenOfNewOrleans22/pseuds/QueenOfNewOrleans22
Summary: Izzy's suicide tears apart the band - and his lover.
Relationships: Axl Rose/Izzy Stradlin
Series: Either - Or [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2014570
Comments: 18
Kudos: 12





	Can You Feel Me?

There was shards of glass on the ground, glinting in the faint light. 

"God!" Axl narrowly avoided slashing his feet open as he walked across the kitchen in a quick stride. His hands were clenched into fists, and he slammed them against the wall, leaning against it, as if searching for support in the most inanimate things. "I feel like I'm talking to myself!" He grit his teeth hard enough to send a bolt of pain through his jaw. 

The darkness of the night was creeping in through the windows, glistening stars and the full, round moon. It was an eerie backdrop, like a painting that was never meant to have been given life. The wind was howling - a storm was incoming, and it would take no prisoners. 

Axl stood there, heart hammering against his ribcage like a jackhammer. There was nothing worse than being angry, and having to let that rage rot like a body in the dirt. 

But the bitter alternative was far worse. 

And there was Izzy, pale skin and dark hair. He was silent as ever, his face carefully neutral, as if he was afraid of showing too much emotion. But that was per usual, since for as long as Axl had known Izzy, he had been a blank slate that had needed somebody else to fill in the colors. 

"You're just gonna stand there, and not say anything?" Axl turned back around, a headache pounding against his skull. "I suppose I shouldn't have hoped for anything else." He tried to ignore that little voice at the back of his head, the voice that was saying to stop before things got worse. 

But Axl had never listened to that little voice, and wasn't going to start now. 

Leaning against the countertop, Izzy licked his lips. He opened his mouth, closed it, and then, for a moment, seemed to consider Axl with those piercingly dark eyes of his that never failed to seem to be that of a far different man. Izzy looked down at the glass, until his hair obscured most of his face. "I'm so _tired."_ He whispered. 

Had the words been uttered during any other time, Axl would've recognized the plain exhaustion. But he wasn't in the right mind, and he didn't give a single damn about the details. "We're all tired, Izzy. _I'm_ tired. You're not the only one whose been working non-stop, but, of course, it's all about fucking you." Axl left the wall and walked over to the fridge. 

Axl bent down and looked at the contents before grabbing a bottle of water, hoping that the coldness would calm his heart. "Because Izzy is the only one who suffers." He muttered, opening the bottle and taking a sip. 

They were alone, because Duff and Slash were off at a bar and Steven had found some girl to fuck and they were alone, alone, alone, a fire and a lake. Light and darkness. Yells and silence. They bounced off of each other in both pleasant and unpleasant ways, giving rise to both desires and anger. They were both fucked up from the lives that they'd been thrust into, and, in some strange way, they'd found solace in each other. 

With what sounded like a choked sob, Izzy covered his eyes. "I can't do this anymore." He mumbled hoarsely, his voice raw from having yelled earlier in the night. It was a rarity, but that didn't mean that it never happened. 

"Do what anymore?" Axl covered the bottle with both of his eyes. "Be with me?" 

The words fell into the silence. 

Axl abruptly stood up, slamming the water bottle down on the table. The chair screeched against the tile unpleasantly, and made Axl's headache that much worse. "Fine." He said, strangely calm, his rage seeping away, replaced by a simple acceptance. "I'll leave you with you, because that's the only person who you really love, huh?" 

" _Shut up!"_ Izzy suddenly screamed, bending down at the waist. He started sobbing, and somewhere in Axl's mind, that registered as wrong because Izzy didn't cry, ever, and in the rare times that he did, then something was seriously wrong. 

But it didn't matter - not in that moment. 

Because it was all over, wasn't it? 

Axl knew it, deep down in his chest. "I don't care. You don't love me? Fine." He stormed off into his room and grabbed his wallet, full of all of his precious money. "Do you want to know why I was with you, Izzy? Do you?" Axl grabbed his jacket, slipped it on, and then bent down to grab his shoes. 

"Because I _pitied_ you. You were such a miserable loner, and I pitied you. I hung out with you because nobody else gave a single fuck about you. And you wanna know what? I didn't, either, but, hey, I figured that I might as well give you some company before you just tossed yourself off a cliff." Axl opened the door, and he turned around, and looked at Izzy. 

They'd spend years together - two freaks who found company in the most unlikely of places. 

But they'd been torn apart, and nothing could glue them back together. 

And yet, Axl felt his heart ache when he saw Izzy, and how utterly broken he looked. Izzy was the man that he'd loved, but there was nothing more to be salvaged from this relationship. 

"I want you out of the band." Axl said quietly. 

Izzy made a strange gasping noise, and he fell onto his backside, burying his face in his hands. "F - fine, _fine."_ Izzy choked out, sounding so utterly pathetic. 

And Axl left. 

He didn't look back as the door slammed shut. 

\- 

Axl went to a bar, and, for the first time in what must've been forever, drowned his sorrows in a bottle. He never usually indulged so freely in alcohol, but he didn't have anything else to do, and it felt so good.

But something was wrong. 

The air was too cold, a fierce change from the usual California heat, and Axl had a bad feeling in his chest that made him feel so terribly sick. As much as he desperately wanted to forget about Izzy, he couldn't, and that made Axl worry that the something that was wrong had something to do with his lover. 

But he didn't care. Let Izzy do whatever he damn well pleased! Axl couldn't be bothered. 

\- 

But then Axl returned back to the house, and his heart dropped, because the front door, which he distinctly remembered shutting, was wide open, giving him an open view into the inside of the house. Axl felt his breathe catch in his throat at the sight of dried blood on the wall, in a shape similar to that of a hand print. 

"Oh, god. Oh, no." Axl moaned, his heart lurching in his chest as he stumbled into the house. It was a disaster from the fight - broken, bloodied glass strewn across the kitchen floor. Torn papers were on the dining table. There were scuff marks on the walls. Axl pressed his hand against the wall as his legs threatened to give out on him in response to the sight that presented itself. 

There was no sign of Izzy anywhere, except for that single bloody hand print. 

Axl forced himself to stand up at the sound of people talking, hoping - no, _praying,_ that everything would be okay. That, maybe, this was some sort of dream, or that Izzy would be in another room, injured but alive, and Axl could make it better again except - 

There was Slash, and he was covered in blood. It stained this shirt and jacket and pants, painting his hands and what was visible of his face, and his eyes - they were the eyes of someone who had seen hell. 

And Duff was there, and he was leaning down, grabbing Slash by the shoulders so that they could look each other in the eye. "Breathe. You gotta - oh, fuck." Duff looked away, blinking, but not fast enough to hide the the tears as they spilt down his ashen face. "Just - _breathe."_

Neither of them noticed Axl. Perhaps they didn't want to notice him. 

Slash was shaking. "He was there he was just laying there and _there was so much blood."_ He looked down at his bloodied hands. "There was so much blood." He repeated, almost as if to hammer the point home. 

"I know. I know, buddy." Duff turned his head, and he stared at Axl, finally noticing him for the first time in what felt like hours, but had only been a minute or so. 

Their eyes locked - terror and grief. 

For a few split seconds, time seemed to stop completely, leaving just them. 

"No. Don't tell me." Axl begged, feeling like a little kid again. He couldn't breathe, and those four words sounded like they were being uttered from a dying man. 

From somewhere else within the house, an angry yell sounded, and something heavy hit the wall, undoubtedly leaving a dent. It wasn't much of a stretch to assume that it was from Steven. 

"Slash - hey, can you give me that?" Duff sounded like he was holding back a sob as he opened his hand in expectation. Slash frantically shook his head, and he held something close to his chest. 

Leaning back, Slash looked like he was about to run away. "No, no." He held on tightly, until Duff won their tug-of-war and pulled away to reveal a letter, crumbled and torn but miraculously intact enough to make out the faint lettering. It was stained with blood, streaked over the words like tossed paint from a frenetic artist. 

Duff looked up, and he held the letter out expectantly. 

"Wha -?" Axl looked at the letter, but he was shaking too badly and - _this couldn't be happening._

 _"Take it."_ Duff hissed, and for the first time in a long time, he looked angry, truly, genuinely angry. His eyes were dark with threat, and his hand wavered slightly, almost as if he wanted to take the letter and run with it. Axl almost thought that he was about to, but Duff stood there, firm and with a distinct glare in his eyes. 

And Axl did take the letter, his hand shaking so bad that it nearly fell from his fingers and down toward the floor. His stomach turned at the blood, and a single tear fell from his eye down to his cheek, over the curve of his chin, and falling onto his shirt. 

" _He's dead!"_ Slash suddenly bursted out, as if he'd been biting back the words and then they'd come spilling past his lips. He raised his hands and pulled at his hair, digging at the roots and pulling at the curls. " _HE'S fucking DEAD!"_

The yell seemed to ring throughout the house and the walls, echoing throughout and repeating itself in Axl's head. ' _He's dead.'_

_He's dead._

_HE'S DEAD_

Axl fell to his knees, clutching the letter in a white-knuckled grip, beginning to hyperventilate at the thought. They'd just saw each other! They'd just talked! 

Except they hadn't talked. They'd fought, and Axl had said - 

Axl had said - 

"Shhh, calm down, Slash." Duff crouched down, wiping at his own eyes for some semblance of calm amongst the chaos. Duff reached up and dragged hid thumbs against Slash's cheeks, trying to get rid of the blood. "I know its hard, but you can't think about it." 

Slash sucked in a desperate breathe. "I can see him." He whispered. 

And it was then that Axl looked at the adjacent bathroom, seeing that the light was on, and saw that there was blood all over. Smeared on the tile, the white walls, everywhere. And on the floor was a single, large piece of glass. 

"I know. I'm sorry." Duff had Slash in a half-hug. "C'mon, we need to - to get the blood off." 

Axl looked up. That was Izzy's blood, and the thought finally ended him. Axl looked down and realized that he was crying - hot tears were falling down his face and onto the letter, smearing the blood and the words. With shaking hands that felt as cold as ice, Axl unfolded the letter. 

In the distance, Steven yelled - "But why? _Why?"_

The handwriting was shaky and scratchy, but it was legible. 

_'I'm sorry, first and foremost. I know that you will be angry at me, Axl. But those last words were true, weren't they? I could feel them, deep in my soul. I'm sorry for wasting your time all these years. Please don't hate me. I cannot bear that. I love you always, Bill. I'm sorry that I didn't do a good enough job of showing you._

_Duff, I'm sorry for leaving you with this mess. I think you're a great guy, a great bassist, and I hope you have an amazing life ahead._

_Steven, don't beat yourself up too hard. You annoyed me to no end but I loved every minute of it. Be the best you, as always._

_Slash, be strong, just like you've always been. Be the man I've always known you to be. I believe in you, dead or alive._

_Dad, Mom, Kevin, Joseph, Sara, and Lesley, I'm sorry for all of this mess. Bury me next to grandpa. I love you guys, I just never knew how to show it._

_Ask that Gilby guy to take my place - the one with the black hair, you guys know him. Give him my good guitars, toss the rest._

_Bill, I hope you're forever happy, and you can find solace. I'm sorry that you had to stay for all of these years. Find that good woman or guy that'll treat you right._

_And to the rest of you - don't kill each other._

_Sincerely,_

_Izzy Stradlin - Jeffrey Isbell'_


End file.
